kqedequalsvolvo
Member
While I was playing Yakuza 0 a few weeks back, I noticed that after playing for maybe 4 or 5 hours, I'd smoked about twice as many cigarettes as I usually would do.
A lot of the characters also smoke (I often have that thing with movies where someone lighting up triggers a low-level craving), there are long cut-scenes to enjoy where I'm not using the pad, lots of the game features bars/nightclubs, and outside of the fighting, the moment to moment gameplay is not reflex heavy. So smoking is easier.
The game doesn't encourage smoking per se, but as someone who already smokes, it seemed to make me want to smoke more - I'd built an association up with the game and smoking which I found really interesting. Now when I sit down to play that game, first cut-scene, I start thinking about lighting up and that doesn't happen with other games. I don't blame the game for that; I've just formed a mental relationship between the two now.
I thought about it and remembered how GTA3 often made me feel like having a beer as I associated that with when I was studying and used to enjoy playing the game with a few cans. Or how the staggered, song-based gameplay in the Miku games would make me check my phone far, far more often than usual as a form of natural break between songs, in an almost compulsive way.
On the other end of the scale, games like Final Fantasy XIV or sports sims would be very reliant on cooperation and concentration so I'd realise I'd smoke far, far less and eat far less if I was playing those kind of games heavily. That is to say, I'd play and not even think about cravings, be that tobacco, food or whatever.
Made me think about friends who associate smoking weed with certain games - where sitting down to play a certain game made them far more likely to smoke weed than others.
For absolute clarity here, I am 1. not encouraging/shaming what people do. Bad is subjective, it's used in a tongue-in-cheek way here 2. This topic is about whether playing certain videogames seem to encourage you to do certain things differently IRL, not to discuss the morality/impact on health etc. of the 'bad habits' being discussed. For example, I'm well aware that smoking is medically, objectively bad for me, that's not the topic
.
TL;DR do you have certain games that make you have a better/worse relationship with the 'bad habits' in your life? Do you think the game's content plays a role or it's just situational?
A lot of the characters also smoke (I often have that thing with movies where someone lighting up triggers a low-level craving), there are long cut-scenes to enjoy where I'm not using the pad, lots of the game features bars/nightclubs, and outside of the fighting, the moment to moment gameplay is not reflex heavy. So smoking is easier.
The game doesn't encourage smoking per se, but as someone who already smokes, it seemed to make me want to smoke more - I'd built an association up with the game and smoking which I found really interesting. Now when I sit down to play that game, first cut-scene, I start thinking about lighting up and that doesn't happen with other games. I don't blame the game for that; I've just formed a mental relationship between the two now.
I thought about it and remembered how GTA3 often made me feel like having a beer as I associated that with when I was studying and used to enjoy playing the game with a few cans. Or how the staggered, song-based gameplay in the Miku games would make me check my phone far, far more often than usual as a form of natural break between songs, in an almost compulsive way.
On the other end of the scale, games like Final Fantasy XIV or sports sims would be very reliant on cooperation and concentration so I'd realise I'd smoke far, far less and eat far less if I was playing those kind of games heavily. That is to say, I'd play and not even think about cravings, be that tobacco, food or whatever.
Made me think about friends who associate smoking weed with certain games - where sitting down to play a certain game made them far more likely to smoke weed than others.
For absolute clarity here, I am 1. not encouraging/shaming what people do. Bad is subjective, it's used in a tongue-in-cheek way here 2. This topic is about whether playing certain videogames seem to encourage you to do certain things differently IRL, not to discuss the morality/impact on health etc. of the 'bad habits' being discussed. For example, I'm well aware that smoking is medically, objectively bad for me, that's not the topic
.TL;DR do you have certain games that make you have a better/worse relationship with the 'bad habits' in your life? Do you think the game's content plays a role or it's just situational?
